Amnesia
by Capstar98
Summary: The most difficult circumstances sometimes come out of the smallest things... and now Bones might never get his friend back.
1. Chapter 1

So yeah - pretty basic story line but i couldn't get this idea out of my head :P I don't really know when this will update next, could depend on how people like it! So enjoy and remember to review!

* * *

"Jim! Watch out!" Kirk heard Bones call frantically. He barely had time to turn around before something hit him on the head, _hard. _

His thoughts scattered and he fell to the ground in a heap, his already bruised head striking the ground. He tried to move but his limbs didn't seem to be listening to him. His vision was blurry but he could see blue rushing towards him.

_Bones._ Bones would make it better. He always made it better.

The blue stopped beside him and Jim felt hands on his face. His eyes kept losing focus and he couldn't keep his lids open much longer. He could hear voices, but couldn't make out what they were saying, like he was underwater.

A sudden sting on his face and a subsequent pinch in his neck brought him back, and he immediately groaned, feeling the harsh pain in his head. He moved his hands up to press it away but they didn't make it half way before being held down.

Jim squirmed, his face contorted to try and control the pain. He could feel the darkness encroaching on his vision again, and this time he could resist it. Despite the panicked calls to stay awake floating above him, he lost the fight and descended into the black.

* * *

McCoy sat back in hair and rubbed a hand over his face, absently noticing the thick stubble on his cheeks. It had been four days. Four days since a falling rock had struck his best friend on the head and left him fighting for his life. Well, not exactly. Jim was alive, and going to stay that way for the foreseeable future, but it wasn't a life if he wasn't awake for it.

Scans showed minimal damage, but the brain was a fickle thing. No one knew if Jim would have any lasting effects, or whether he would wake up at all.

McCoy felt his throat swell as he thought about it, and he rubbed at his eyes. Jim _was _waking up. He always survived, healthy and whole, somehow – and this wasn't going to be the exception. However, there wasn't much they could do at this point besides wait.

And it was killing him.

He hadn't gotten more than a few hours' sleep in the past four days, and he knew Spock hadn't either. In fact, the entire command crew was incredibly worried. It was disconcerting to them to see McCoy doing nothing as Jim still lay there, and even more disconcerting to see Jim himself lie so still.

The doctor leaned forward onto his elbows and grabbed one of Jim's hands. "Come on, Jim. Wake up, already," he begged.

Another half an hour passed that way, and just as McCoy was about to turn back to his work, he stiffened, his eyes widening.

The monitor showed an increased heart rate, and McCoy could have sworn he felt fingers moving beneath his hand.

"Jim?" He stood and looked closely at Jim's face. The eyelids flickered, and McCoy could've cried from relief. "Jim!" he exclaimed, a hand flying to brush back his friend's golden hair. Then his eyes opened, and McCoy was met with the blue he thought he might never see again.

Jim's brows contracted, a confused look coming over his features. He started squirming, fighting to sit up and brushing off McCoy's hands as his heart rate increased.

"Jim, calm down. You're in sickbay. Your head was hit but you'll be fine. Just calm down for me."

But Jim didn't calm down. As he gained control of his consciousness his eyes continually flitted around, never laying on anything for more than a second, and he tried to get up and out of his bed. McCoy pushed him back and the captain's eyes finally landed on him. McCoy was blown away by the uncertainty in them, but it wasn't as if he had never dealt with this side of Jim before.

"Jim, it's okay. You're in sickbay." McCoy was relieved when the heart rate slowed on the monitor and Jim lay back in his bed.

"Thirsty," he heard Jim mumble, and stuffed a cup of water in his friend's hands.

He sat down in the chair again. "How do you feel? If your head hurts we can get you something for it."

"No, I feel fine," Jim responded.

"What do you remember?"

Jim frowned, shaking his head. "I don't know. What happened to me?"

"You got hit by a falling rock. Pretty sizable one too, and then hit your head again when you fell." He shook his head. "You should've worn a helmet or something – we've all been really worried. You've been out for four days."

Jim sputtered. "Four days!? Wow." His eyes glanced around. "So… where am, I doc? Somewhere with rocks, I'm guessing."

McCoy frowned. Something wasn't right here. "Uh… bed thirteen?"

"Not really what I meant." Jim's features tightened and his breathing increased. "I don't remember… I – what planet am I on?"

McCoy himself was starting to freak out a little bit. "You're on the _Enterprise, _kid. In sickbay." He paused. "I swear if you're just pulling my leg here I'm gonna kill you." His anxiety increased as Jim continued to look frustrated with his lack of memories.

"The _Enterprise_… " He looked down at McCoy's uniform. "Starfleet?"

McCoy stood abruptly. "What's the last thing you remember?" he asked frantically.

"Uh… I was on Risa recently… I think." That was true – they had been to Risa for shore leave. "I was leaving for Iowa?" Jim clenched his fists. "I don't remember!" Iowa?

McCoy froze and he spoke to his friend with a level voice. "What's your name and rank?"

"James T Kirk, and – I – rank? I don't know." His heart rate continued to increase. "Is that bad?"

McCoy fought to keep his face neutral and ignored the question. "Do you know who I am?"

"You're my doctor, aren't you?"

And damn it all, but he couldn't stay there a moment longer. Without saying another word McCoy turned and walked back to his office, leaving Jim in confused uncertainty behind him.


	2. Chapter 2

"He doesn't know where he is, goddamnit! Aren't you listening to me?" McCoy growled as he paced the floor in his office. Spock sat in a chair in front of him, and though he looked outwardly calm, there was a crease in his brow and tension in his shoulders. "The last thing he remembers is leaving to go to Iowa, which was right before Pike picked him up and he went to Starfleet! He doesn't remember us at all." He finished quietly, stealing a glance over to Jim's biobed. The man in question was asleep again; unaware of the stress he was giving his friends right now.

"What do you propose we do, doctor?" Spock asked, his fists clenching.

McCoy shook his head. "Well, our only hope is that this could be temporary. I think the best thing to do would be to talk to him, tell him about _Enterprise_, get the bridge crew down here to see him, and –" he broke off, swallowing roughly before collapsing in his desk chair, his hands over his eyes. "I just – I can't do this without him, Spock."

Spock looked over at Jim, the worry in his face increasing as well. "I feel the same," he replied.

The whole reason McCoy had gone into the black in the first place was to follow his idiot of a best friend and make sure he didn't… well, to make sure nothing like this happened. And look how that had turned out. Not only had he not done his job, but if Jim never got his memory back, what would happen to their friendship? He had worked so hard and for so long to get Jim Kirk to trust him. With Jim's mind back to a pre-Starfleet state, all of that would be lost.

They had to get his memory back.

An hour later Jim was awake again, and McCoy walked in to see him trying to sit up and get out of bed.

"Oh no you don't!" McCoy shouted, grabbing the shoulder of his captain and pushing him back on the bed. "You're not goin' anywhere until we've got everything sorted. You might feel okay now, but that's just all the drugs and your damned stubbornness."

Jim turned to him, annoyance flickering in his eyes. "Then will you tell me what the hell's going on? Was I drugged or something? Why am I on a ship a thousand klicks from the nearest planet?"

McCoy shook his head. "It's a bit complicated, Jim."

"Bullshit it's complicated. Give me the truth."

"The truth's not something you're gonna warm up to easily. What did you say was the last thing you remember?"

"Spending the night on Risa. I caught a shuttle to get back to Earth, but I don't remember ever getting there."

McCoy nodded. So nothing new had come back yet. "Okay. I'm gonna show you some pictures, and you tell me what they are."

"Seriously?" Jim said incredulously.

McCoy ignored him and held up a picture. "What's this?"

Jim stared at him. "We're really doing this?"

"Damn straight! Now give me an answer!"

"A house."

Another picture.

"Dog."

Another.

"Wow that one looks like you!"

It was a picture of an old man with a walking stick. At least he hadn't lost his sense of humor.

McCoy put the cards away. "Alright, enough of that. Here, follow my finger with your eyes." Jim just scowled down at the covers. "Listen, man, if you don't do it I'll be forced to put you through even more tests." Reluctantly, Jim looked up and followed his finger.

"Am I good?" Jim growled when McCoy finished. "I'm not really a big fan of hospitals. I'd like to get out of here as soon as possible." His eyes flashed up at McCoy and then to the door, and his fingers twitched on the bed.

McCoy sighed as looked down at his friend. For the past few minutes, as he tested his friend, it was almost as if nothing was wrong. Jim and McCoy talked that way all the time. It was Jim's true discomfort that bothered McCoy the most. He could tell that Jim wanted out badly. He didn't know this place – didn't know his history with it, and didn't know that he was truly safe here. Not that he had ever really liked Sickbay, but he had never quite had that cornered look in his eye before.

McCoy pulled up a chair and sat next to the bed. "Look, Jim, there's something I haven't told you."

"Yeah, I figured." Jim looked at him out of the corner of his eye. "Do we know each other or something? You keep calling me Jim."

McCoy's heart twisted a little in his chest. "Yeah, we know each other."

Jim's face faltered. "How well?"

He bit the inside of his cheek. "I met you six years ago on the shuttle from Riverside to San Francisco. You're my best friend. My brother."

The cornered look was back in full force. "What are you talking about?"

"You did go to Iowa, but you didn't stay there for long. Christopher Pike recruited you out of a bar. You spent the next three years at Starfleet Academy, and the years after that as the Captain of this ship, the _USS Enterprise._"

Jim had gone very pale. "You're shitting me. Please tell me you're fucking with me."

McCoy rubbed a hand through his hair, weary. "I'm not fucking with you."

Faster than McCoy could stop, Jim leapt out of his bed and grabbed the nearest PADD. He opened it and was met with the date.

Leonard watched as Jim gripped the table, his knuckles turning white, his back heaving with gasps. He walked up to the younger man slowly and put a hand on his shoulder. "Jim, calm down. We'll figure this out."

"Get the fuck off me!" Jim flinched away from his touch. McCoy's heart tugged. Jim hadn't flinched like that in a long time. But he was stressed out right now, and confused. In Jim's head, he didn't know who McCoy was, and as much as it hurt him to do it, he needed to give the kid some space. He wasn't helping things by being so touchy. His hand clenched into a fist at his side.

Jim stared at the date on the PADD for a minute before turning to him and looking him in the eye, his face pale. "What the fuck," he breathed, his voice breaking. "What the fuck. This can't be real. This kinda shit doesn't happen in real life. No … No."

Leonard just looked at him sadly.

Jim's hand went up and grasped his hair, and he shuddered as he took a deep breath. "Okay. Nope, this is a hoax. I remember everything before waking up here. My whole life. If I had some kind of traumatic brain injury, it wouldn't happen like that would it? Something must have happened – something must have happened on the shuttle back to Earth. Right?" He looked at McCoy desperately, but the doctor just shook his head.

"I'm not trying to mess with you, Jim. What I said is all true."

Jim took another deep breath. "Well, good. Cause I'd have told you you're a fucking shitty comedian."

McCoy smiled in spite of himself, but his smile fell again as Jim groaned and reached for his head.

"I know you're confused, but standing isn't gonna help you any," he remarked as he pushed Jim gently back to the biobed. "You need rest if your brain's gonna recover from this."

Jim laid down, nodding absently, then turned back to him. "I thought that sleeping was bad for head injuries."

"On the contrary," he responded. He continued when Jim still looked suspicious, "I told you I'm not pulling one over on you. Now who's the doctor here?"

Scowling, but resigned, Jim pulled the covers up and over him. His eyes started to twitch around again though, as he remembered he didn't know anything about where he was.

"You might not believe me, but you're safe here," McCoy said, trying to get him to relax. He sighed. "Do you want a sedative to help you sleep?"

"No!" Jim responded, a little too quickly. "I mean, no. I'm fine. And anyways, I'm allergic to everything."

"You'll find that I'm pretty well versed in your allergies."

Jim's eyes narrowed a little, then he nodded. "Right. Six years." His gaze turned off into the middle distance. "Fuck. I can't believe this. How could I forget _six years_ of my life? You sure you're not shitting me?"

"I'm sure."

Contemplating this, he said, "Huh. I didn't know I could keep a guy around me for that long." He gave a huff of a laugh, but McCoy's chest just compressed at the words. "You must be either stubborn, or stupid."

Leonard quirked a brow. "A little bit of both, I'd say. Now get to sleep. You need it."

"Aye, aye, captain," Jim finished as he waved him off with a mock salute.

* * *

Uh, hey everybody! I know that at this point none of you were expecting to see this update, if you even remembered what this story was. At any rate, I'm doing my best to write this thing. And this may seem impossible considering my track record, but I'll be updating a few times in the next week.

Please let me know what you think, and if you have any suggestions about little scenes to add, I'd love to hear them. Thanks!


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